Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)
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288. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if she plans to introduce increased training for teachers to promote awareness of dyspraxia in the classroom; if she plans to increase supports for dyspraxia pupils; and her views on the need to transition to an evidence-of-need approach to the allocation of accommodations from the evidence-of-deficit approach which is currently in place. [60388/22]

Josepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputy for the question and would advise the following:

Enabling children with special educational needs to receive an education is a priority for this Government.

For 2022, my Department will spend in excess of €2.3 Billion, or over 25% of the Department’s budget on providing a wide range of schemes and supports for children with special educational needs.

For 2023, this spend will be substantially increased by over 10%, meaning that for 2023 my Department will spend over €2.6 billion on special education.

This level of educational funding and support is unprecedented and represents in excess of 27% of the Department’s total allocation for 2023.

The Department provides for a range of services and supports to ensure that children of school going age with Special Educational Needs, including children with Dyspraxia, can have access to an education appropriate to their needs.

The functions of the National Council for Special Education (NCSE) include planning and coordinating the provision of education and support services to children with special educational needs in conjunction with schools and the Health Service Executive (HSE).

The NCSE, through its network of local Special Educational Needs Organisers (SENOs), is responsible for processing applications from schools for special educational needs supports as required.  The NCSE is aware of emerging need from year to year and where special provision is required it is planned and established to meet that need.

The NCSE provides for support for teachers with additional training needs in the area of Dyspraxia through the NCSE Support Service which manages, co-ordinates and develops a range of supports in response to identified teacher training needs.

The NCSE Support Service provides Teacher Professional Learning (TPL) support for teachers of pupils with Dyspraxia through an Inclusive Learning Resource Teachers course as well as an online resource facility and an online book borrowing facility. The Support Service continues to update current Teacher Professional Learning (TPL) courses for teachers and design new TPL courses in response to the needs of teachers.

Detailed information on the comprehensive programme of Teacher Professional Learning seminars on a variety of special educational needs topics is published on the NCSE website. 

Students with Dyspraxia may be entitled to additional teaching provision in school, under the Special Education Teaching model. The Special Education Teaching (SET) allocation provides a single unified allocation for special educational support teaching needs to each school, based on each school’s educational profile. This model has replaced the previous model of allocating resource teaching support and learning support to schools based on a diagnosis of disability.

The Special Education Teacher allocation, allows schools to provide additional teaching support for all pupils who require such support in their schools and for schools to deploy resources based on each pupil’s individual learning needs.

The allocation gives greater flexibility to schools as to how they can deploy their resources, to take account of the actual learning needs pupils have, as opposed to being guided by a particular diagnosis of disability, and schools are guided as to how they should make such allocation decisions.

The school will take account of learning needs of children as evidenced by performance in schools but also supported where relevant by information provided regarding the nature of a condition that a pupil may have.

The Department of Education has published guidelines for schools as to how they should utilise and deploy their resources under the new allocation model. The guidelines support schools in how they identify pupils for additional teaching support and decide how much support to provide for pupils who need it.These guidelines are available at www.gov.ie/en/publication/edf64-guidelines-for-primary-schools-supporting-pupils-with-special-educational-needs-in-mainstream-schools/.

The guidelines will support schools in how they identify students, including students with Dyspraxia/DCD for additional teaching support, and decide how much support to provide, taking into account the extent and severity of their needs.

A process is available where schools can seek a review of their SET allocation by the National Council for Special Education (NCSE), including the utilisation of their allocations. Detailed information on the NCSE review process is published on the NCSE website ncse.ie/special-education-teachers.

In circumstances where students with Dyspraxia/Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD) have care needs to the extent that the school considers SNA support is required for them to attend and access the curriculum, they may be supported by Special Needs Assistants.

SNA support is provided specifically to assist recognised primary, post primary and special schools to cater for the care needs of students with disabilities in an educational context, where the nature of these care needs have been outlined in professional reports as being so significant that a student will require adult assistance in order to be able to attend school and to participate in education, in accordance with the criteria set out in my Departments Circular 30/2014.

SNAs are not allocated to individual children but to schools as a school based resource. The deployment of SNAs within schools is a matter for the individual Principal/Board of Management of the school.  SNAs should be deployed by the school in a manner which best meets the care support requirements of the children enrolled in the school for whom SNA support has been allocated. 

Schools can apply to the NCSE for an Exceptional Review of their SNA allocation and detailed information on the NCSE Exceptional Review process is published on the NCSE website: ncse.ie/application-for-sna-exceptional-review.

The NCSE will endeavour to respond to all applications for Exceptional Review received as expediently as possible and in that regard, it will prioritise applications from schools with no current SNA allocation and developing schools. The Exceptional Review process for mainstream allocations will be available to schools throughout the 2022/23 school year.

Funding is also provided to schools towards the cost of assistive technology, for children with special educational needs which is essential for educational purposes, to assist children with special educational needs in Primary, Post Primary and Special schools, in accordance with the criteria set out in my Department's Circular 0010/2013.

Detailed information on the application process is published on the NCSE website: ncse.ie/assistive-technology.

All post primary school students with special needs may have special arrangements made for them while sitting State examinations such as the Leaving Certificate and Junior Certificate. Candidates with disabilities can apply through their school for reasonable accommodation during examinations. Further details of supports are available from the State Examinations Commission (SEC) Reasonable Accommodations Section.

At third level, the National Office for Equity of Access to Third Level Education, within the Higher Education Authority (HEA), administers a number of access measures including the Fund for Students with Disabilities (FSD), the purpose of which is to assist students with disabilities.A range of supports are available at third level colleges to support students who have disabilities or special educational needs. Details of the additional support and services that are available for students with medical conditions/disabilities at third level colleges will be provided by the Disability Officers at each college.

The supports which will be provided for students with special educational needs, including Dyspraxia/Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD), will take account of the needs that each student has and the type of college or course that they are attending.

Students with disabilities or severe medical conditions should contact the Disability Office before the beginning of the academic year to find out what disability supports will be available to them and will need to discuss with the Disability/Access Officer in the college/university details of their needs based requirement in college.